The Stock Market is a way to buy, sell or hold onto “stocks” of a company. “Stocks” are a piece of a company that is owned entirely by the public. The price of a stock is dependant on supply and demand. If there isa company with ten thousand “shares” of stocks available and each is valued at one dollar. You buy one hundred stocks. If the company you bought stocks in makes cutting edge new products and releases statements saying “our product is one of a kind revolutionary,” all of a sudden everyone wants to own part of this company, the value of each stock goes up, now every stock is worth two dollars. Your one hundred stocks saw a 100% growth because the supply is less than the demand. You now have a choice to sell your stock or hold it and wait to see if it goes up more. If you sell it back to the company they will give you two dollars per share, but you decide to wait it out, instead of going up more the company releases a statement saying “our new technology actually doesn’t work as well as we thought it would and crashes all the time.” The value of the company plummets to ninety cents a stock. You decide you don’t want to mess around with this stock and decide to sell. You lost ten cents per share but compared to people who bought the share at two dollars you got off easy.
an example of a graph or a companies value vs. date
If we used this line chart of a companies value as an example you see it compares date to price. So in early January of 200 the stock dropped to about 34 dollars a share. this is the ideal time to buy stocks. Then about 10 days later the stock was up to 43 dollars. Now you have to decide whether to sell, or wait because you think the price can go up even more. As you can see there really is no pattern and guessing whens best to sell sometimes just relies on gut instinct.
The stock market is a constant game of money and every second the price changes and that’s why professionals spend all day trading stocks back and forth.
HOURS OF OPERATION The New York Stock Exchange, on of the biggest places to trade stock, as well as the S&P 500 (with only 500 big name stocks) and the NASDAQ is open from 9:30 to 4:00, 5 days a week excluding national holidays. Traders can trade before and after the regular hours of operation for a small additional fee, but the biggest changes happen during the day. This photo shows the crazy rush of hundreds of brokers, the people who buy and sell stocks, running around, talking to other brokers and trying to make as much money as possible. In the beginning of the stock market people would sell certificates of owning a stock and to buy it you would have to go to a stand, or an office. Now everything is online, the only thing that remains are the crazy trading floors, that even though they don't sell certificates and everything id done on computers, is still a bustling place filled with hundreds of people Each country has their hours of operation depending on time zones but the biggest markets that are tied in with the U.S. markets are the markets of Asia, China in particular and the markets of the Middle East which supply a lot of the United States’ oil. A stock might change value between the end of one day and the beginning of another, but “off-hour” trading is not very common. After interviewing a man who has been playing the game of stocks for over thirty years first through email and then in a sit down interview I really got into the question of how much time do you spend watching stocks, and the answer is always. After seeing my dad go through a crazy routine everyday ever since I remember you realize how much time is spent online. My dad is awake and at the computer by eight o’clock, having the tv on in the background on NBC Market Watch and eyes glued to the screen. At exactly nine thirty on NBC a bell rings indicating the start of the trading day. At exactly four thirty you hear the same bell again signaling the closing of the markets, at this point my dad spends a few more hours on the computer until he is done. This work is very difficult because it requires a lot of focus, insight and an eye for certain detail. A big perk to this job is being able to have a break whenever you want and have unlimited vacation time because you are your own boss, and the amount of money you make all depends on how much money you put in. DAY TRADER There are two main ways to trade stocks in the stock market, day traders and long term traders. A common question is which can make you richer or which is easier and the answer to that is impossible to say. Day traders buy and sell stocks during a single day. Day traders will buy a huge quantity of stocks in one company and hope for the value to go up even by five cents, and then quickly sell it. Day traders play pennies, but in huge quantities pennies can make many hundreds of dollars. The biggest problem with day trading is if you buy a stock and it drops in price, even a penny you already lost a lot of money. Day trading is all about buying a low point and selling at a high point because if you look at a graph of only one days value the total can change anywhere from a penny to twenty dollars a day. LONG TERM INVESTING Long term investing is a little bit more confusing and involves many more things to consider. Long term traders can own several stocks at once, some maybe even a few hundred, but the concept is to buy stocks at the lowest price and sell at the highest. This cycle could take years and years and someone could buy a stock and pass it down from generation to generation. Gold is a great example, the price of gold has been going up steadily for a while now and is one of the last few things almost guaranteed to continue going up.
THE RECESSION Today the recession is still a big topic of discussion. Once problems like this hit the stock market things can go spiraling down fast. If people lose money in the stock market from the early stages of the recession many people will then “get out of the game,” and sell all their stocks, hoping to get out before prices plummet and this first step of many people selling the stocks can cause even more problems because now there are less people to buy the same amount of stocks. The supply is heavier than the demand and all the people who still have their now near worthless stocks have no choice, if they sell they lose money, if they hold then they still have no money BONDS Bonds are a way for government to borrow money from the people. The government borrows ten thousand dollars from you, so they give you a receipt promising to pay back that money when you turn it back in to the government in five years. BUT if you decide to let the government hold on to your money for longer and you still have your receipt, or bond, you can earn interest on it. So a bond issued for one dollar in 1905 may now be worth two hundred dollars.
CURRENT STATUS OF THE MARKET
Today the market is in a stable condition. after all the troubles in 08 and part of 09 the stock market has recovered. many people were worried that after the fall in prices in 08 that when the stocks were slowly recovering that it was false hope and that it was really just a small bounce, and would drop even farther down, just like in the Great Depression. In the Great Depression prices didn't plum it out of nowhere. What happened was there was a small stutter in the market, everyone panicked and everyone sold their stocks. However we got lucky and recovered strong from 08 and finishing out the 4th quarter this year (each year is divided into 4 sections each 3 months long.) And the first quarter of next year looks promising with many companies ready to release new products
ME: hi dad so i had some questions about the stock market.
first: what are the usual hours of operation and can you trade outside of those hours? second: if the stock market is so risky why do people continue to "play" the stock market thankyou
jacob
DAD: Hi Jacob, The normal hours of operation of the New York Stock Exchange is between 9:30 am and 4 pm during week days, however you can trade during so called extended hours couple hours before and after. Recently majority of the public pulled off the stock market because of the major losses during the financial crisis and feeling of the uneven playing field by the public versus professional traders.
ME: but if people are pulling off the stock market doesnt that effect everything because now there are less people to buy the same amout of stocks, so the balance between supply and demand is off, isnt it?
DAD: It does affect the ballance of supply and demand, less companies going public and less capital they can raise. It should be noted however that higher market goes more people are getting back which is happenning recently. Often that leads to the market corrections
ME: one last question, what does it really take to succeed in the market? just luck, or is there more?
DAD: It takes a lot of study work and patience and to be lucky does not hurt
STOCK MARKET
Jacob BogdanovThe Stock Market is a way to buy, sell or hold onto “stocks” of a company. “Stocks” are a piece of a company that is owned entirely by the public. The price of a stock is dependant on supply and demand. If there isa company with ten thousand “shares” of stocks available and each is valued at one dollar. You buy one hundred stocks. If the company you bought stocks in makes cutting edge new products and releases statements saying “our product is one of a kind revolutionary,” all of a sudden everyone wants to own part of this company, the value of each stock goes up, now every stock is worth two dollars. Your one hundred stocks saw a 100% growth because the supply is less than the demand. You now have a choice to sell your stock or hold it and wait to see if it goes up more. If you sell it back to the company they will give you two dollars per share, but you decide to wait it out, instead of going up more the company releases a statement saying “our new technology actually doesn’t work as well as we thought it would and crashes all the time.” The value of the company plummets to ninety cents a stock. You decide you don’t want to mess around with this stock and decide to sell. You lost ten cents per share but compared to people who bought the share at two dollars you got off easy.
If we used this line chart of a companies value as an example you see it compares date to price. So in early January of 200 the stock dropped to about 34 dollars a share. this is the ideal time to buy stocks. Then about 10 days later the stock was up to 43 dollars. Now you have to decide whether to sell, or wait because you think the price can go up even more. As you can see there really is no pattern and guessing whens best to sell sometimes just relies on gut instinct.
The stock market is a constant game of money and every second the price changes and that’s why professionals spend all day trading stocks back and forth.
HOURS OF OPERATION
The New York Stock Exchange, on of the biggest places to trade stock, as well as the S&P 500 (with only 500 big name stocks) and the NASDAQ is open from 9:30 to 4:00, 5 days a week excluding national holidays. Traders can trade before and after the regular hours of operation for a small additional fee, but the biggest changes happen during the day.
Each country has their hours of operation depending on time zones but the biggest markets that are tied in with the U.S. markets are the markets of Asia, China in particular and the markets of the Middle East which supply a lot of the United States’ oil. A stock might change value between the end of one day and the beginning of another, but “off-hour” trading is not very common. After interviewing a man who has been playing the game of stocks for over thirty years first through email and then in a sit down interview I really got into the question of how much time do you spend watching stocks, and the answer is always. After seeing my dad go through a crazy routine everyday ever since I remember you realize how much time is spent online. My dad is awake and at the computer by eight o’clock, having the tv on in the background on NBC Market Watch and eyes glued to the screen. At exactly nine thirty on NBC a bell rings indicating the start of the trading day. At exactly four thirty you hear the same bell again signaling the closing of the markets, at this point my dad spends a few more hours on the computer until he is done. This work is very difficult because it requires a lot of focus, insight and an eye for certain detail. A big perk to this job is being able to have a break whenever you want and have unlimited vacation time because you are your own boss, and the amount of money you make all depends on how much money you put in.
DAY TRADER
There are two main ways to trade stocks in the stock market, day traders and long term traders. A common question is which can make you richer or which is easier and the answer to that is impossible to say. Day traders buy and sell stocks during a single day. Day traders will buy a huge quantity of stocks in one company and hope for the value to go up even by five cents, and then quickly sell it. Day traders play pennies, but in huge quantities pennies can make many hundreds of dollars. The biggest problem with day trading is if you buy a stock and it drops in price, even a penny you already lost a lot of money. Day trading is all about buying a low point and selling at a high point because if you look at a graph of only one days value the total can change anywhere from a penny to twenty dollars a day.
LONG TERM INVESTING
Long term investing is a little bit more confusing and involves many more things to consider. Long term traders can own several stocks at once, some maybe even a few hundred, but the concept is to buy stocks at the lowest price and sell at the highest. This cycle could take years and years and someone could buy a stock and pass it down from generation to generation. Gold is a great example, the price of gold has been going up steadily for a while now and is one of the last few things almost guaranteed to continue going up.
THE RECESSION
Today the recession is still a big topic of discussion. Once problems like this hit the stock market things can go spiraling down fast. If people lose money in the stock market from the early stages of the recession many people will then “get out of the game,” and sell all their stocks, hoping to get out before prices plummet and this first step of many people selling the stocks can cause even more problems because now there are less people to buy the same amount of stocks. The supply is heavier than the demand and all the people who still have their now near worthless stocks have no choice, if they sell they lose money, if they hold then they still have no money
BONDS
Bonds are a way for government to borrow money from the people. The government borrows ten thousand dollars from you, so they give you a receipt promising to pay back that money when you turn it back in to the government in five years. BUT if you decide to let the government hold on to your money for longer and you still have your receipt, or bond, you can earn interest on it. So a bond issued for one dollar in 1905 may now be worth two hundred dollars.
CURRENT STATUS OF THE MARKET
Today the market is in a stable condition. after all the troubles in 08 and part of 09 the stock market has recovered. many people were worried that after the fall in prices in 08 that when the stocks were slowly recovering that it was false hope and that it was really just a small bounce, and would drop even farther down, just like in the Great Depression. In the Great Depression prices didn't plum it out of nowhere. What happened was there was a small stutter in the market, everyone panicked and everyone sold their stocks. However we got lucky and recovered strong from 08 and finishing out the 4th quarter this year (each year is divided into 4 sections each 3 months long.) And the first quarter of next year looks promising with many companies ready to release new products
Data bases:
- EJ3011980101&mode=view
-CX3048900654&mode=view
-http://www.worldbookonline.com/student/article?id=ar726547&st=nyse
sites:
-http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wall_Street
-http://www.nyse.com/
-http://www.nasdaq.com/
In times square one of the big bright signs is the NASDAQ sign. towering over many other signs advertises one of the bigger trading markets. Inside the building you can see many TV screens filled with constantly changing numbers and a TV studio that spends most of the day evaluating stocks.
INTERVIEW WITH AN EXPERT
ME:
hi dad
so i had some questions about the stock market.
first: what are the usual hours of operation and can you trade outside of those hours?
second: if the stock market is so risky why do people continue to "play" the stock market
thankyou
jacob
DAD:
Hi Jacob, The normal hours of operation of the New York Stock Exchange is between 9:30 am and 4 pm during week days, however you can trade during so called extended hours couple hours before and after. Recently majority of the public pulled off the stock market because of the major losses during the financial crisis and feeling of the uneven playing field by the public versus professional traders.
ME:
but if people are pulling off the stock market doesnt that effect everything because now there are less people to buy the same amout of stocks, so the balance between supply and demand is off, isnt it?
DAD:
It does affect the ballance of supply and demand, less companies going public and less capital they can raise. It should be noted however that higher market goes more people are getting back which is happenning recently. Often that leads to the market corrections
ME:
one last question, what does it really take to succeed in the market? just luck, or is there more?
DAD:
It takes a lot of study work and patience and to be lucky does not hurt
ME:thank you dad,